Chicago police officer with PTSD struggles to find treatment

September 19, 2013|By Annie Sweeney, Chicago Tribune reporter

Chicago police Officer Brian Warner this month at the corner of Chicago Avenue and Wells Street, where he and his then-partner exchanged gunfire in February 2011 with a suspect they were driving to their district. The suspect was killed, and Warner was wounded. (Brian Cassella, Chicago Tribune)

Chicago cop Brian Warner sat poolside at a Florida getaway, secretly doubling up on rum and Cokes after a day of golfing.

Only 24 hours earlier, Warner was scrambling in a panic to get away from a gunman in the back seat of his squad car at a North Side intersection. A panhandler Warner had arrested stunned him and his partner by opening fire in the close quarters of the Crown Victoria. Warner was shot as he fled the still-rolling car, and both officers returned numerous rounds, leaving the man lifeless and slumped over on Chicago Avenue.

Warner's cellphone was blowing up in Florida with calls from friends back home asking about the shootout. The veteran officer was matter-of-fact and patient in his answers, almost cavalier about what had happened.

Then Warner's close friend, Rick Hendrick, slipped into the kitchen to prepare salsa and guacamole for their group of buddies.

"I'm slicing and dicing, and Brian comes in. He's leaning on the counter watching me. I see him start to laugh," Hendrick recalled. He casually asked his friend of 15 years what was so funny and glanced up for an answer.

But it would be 15 months before Warner would begin the treatment he needed to deal with the haunting emotions that surfaced that afternoon in February 2011 in Florida: guilt for killing a person and surviving when officers before him had not, fear over how close he came to not seeing his children again.

In the end, psychologists concluded Warner, who joined the force in 1994, had post-traumatic stress disorder, and the department determined he was unfit for duty. In June he was approved for full disability, a rare case of a law enforcement officer being granted disability for mental health injuries suffered on the job.

An investigation remains open regarding alleged mistakes made before the shooting, but the city recently recognized Warner for his actions that day by bestowing two awards.

Warner's recovery was delayed, he contends, by the department not doing enough to help him recognize or treat how the shooting had affected him. Instead of embraced, he felt isolated and even punished for what had happened.

There were individual expressions of support. A chaplain who reached out to him in Florida. Two police officials who called him after he quit his department counseling sessions, one with the name of a doctor. But those calls took months, he said.

And though Warner feels bitter toward the department, he has waged a dogged crusade for a more cohesive response to officers suffering under the daily blast of violence they see on Chicago streets.

He started a support group for officers with one of his doctors. He joined with veteran and retired officers to re-energize a police survivor's group that focuses on severe physical injuries. He sought meetings with the brass, convinced that there are other officers who, while escaping injury, suffer quietly from mental anguish.

"I told them, 'I am not here to rock any boats. I am not trying to get anyone fired,' " Warner, 47, said of one early meeting. "I want to help the next guy going through this."

Arresting an aggressive panhandler was about as routine as it got for Warner in February 2011. He and partner Steve Pilafas had been assigned such calls for seven years in the Near North Side district.

Warner and Pilafas were called to a high-rise in the 200 block of East Ohio Street after witnesses said a panhandler accosted a tenant getting out of a taxi.

But Reginald Hardaman, 56, wasn't going easy, according to police reports. He punched Pilafas in the head, leading the officers to pin him against a wall and handcuff him, the reports state. Pilafas searched the "combative" Hardaman, and they put him in the squad and started back toward the district.

As they approached the light at Chicago and Wells Street, a fidgeting Hardaman caught Pilafas' attention. He glanced back, alerting Warner to trouble. Both officers reported seeing a gun protruding from behind Hardaman's back. He had managed to secret the gun under the two pairs of pants and five tops he was wearing.

Pilafas got out of the car, but Warner tried to put it in park. After hearing a gunshot, Warner decided to abandon the still-moving vehicle, according to his account to detectives. As he was getting out, a second shot rang out, tearing through the driver's seat and hitting Warner in the back, causing a minor wound.

From the street, both officers reported, they heard and saw Hardaman firing from inside the car and returned fire.

It took only a few seconds for the most typical of calls to go horribly wrong. But in Warner's memory, it took forever.